How to animate a gif from a video clip

This article was taken from the March 2013 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.

Tumblr has turned gifs into an art form. If you want to create your own from a favourite TV or movie scene you'll need Photoshop Elements and some patience. Also beware that some browsers reduce the frame rate of animated gifs so you may experience your gifs running slower on the web than on your computer.

1. Trim your clip Clips of one to four seconds work best when animating in Elements. Although that may not seem like very long, you'll be surprised how much fits in to it. Once trimmed, save your file as .avi, .wmv, .asf, .mpg, .mpeg or .m1v.

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2. Open Elements With the Photoshop Elements application open, navigate to "file", then "import", then "frame from video" from the drop-down menu. Then use "browse" to select your file, which will open in the video viewer.

3. Grab frames Click "grab frame" then gradually move the slider along to the right to grab more frames. Try to move the slider the same amount along the bar for each "grab" to make the animation as smooth as possible.

4. Stack layers Each frame will be open as an individual image.

Double-click the first image in the Project Bin so it appears in your editing area, then drag each frame on to the first one to create a layer stack of frames.

5. Save your gif Once you have your frames stacked, navigate to "file" then "save for web". In the settings, choose "gif" and tick the "animate" box. If Elements says your file is too large, go to "image" and "resize" then redo that step.

This article was first published in the March 2013 issue of WIRED magazine